


light burning backwards

by chateauofmyheart



Category: Once Upon A Time In Hollywood (2019)
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Injury Recovery, Just a hint of, M/M, Men Crying, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Touch-Starved, aka rick's epic shitfests, smoking and swearing and all that good stuff, undiagnosed bipolar/bpd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-11
Updated: 2020-03-29
Packaged: 2021-02-25 11:42:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22215526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chateauofmyheart/pseuds/chateauofmyheart
Summary: Rick deals with the hand he's been dealt.
Relationships: Cliff Booth & Rick Dalton, Cliff Booth/Rick Dalton
Comments: 55
Kudos: 125





	1. break like a fever

**Author's Note:**

> title pulled from candice wuehle's 'bolt of tulle // sublime disgrace': "...i'm / light burning backwards, the opposite of a dying / star."
> 
> content warnings for this chapter: descriptions of gore, vomiting, violence against women (it's a quentin tarantino movie)
> 
> this was written for me and the three people who actually got invested in these characters

“I am full. I am boiling over. I am fragile. / I am terrified to say that. To say I break like a fever.”

— Desireé Dallagiacomo, from “I Break Like a Fever,”

*

Rick steps out of heaven. A house, a living room. Full to the brim with light, so much that it spills out over the doorstep and runs down the driveway, leaks out of the half-shut windows.

Sharon Tate must be an angel, he thinks. Or God. Her house; heaven, or something like it. Probably the closest he’s ever gonna get. Warm, golden, friendly. Her friends are all smiles and music, jaunty and cheerful, swaying and calling it dancing because Sharon is pretty damn pregnant and everyone else is pretty damn drunk.

Her voice is sweet as it calls out behind him. It takes a second to hear the words “You sure you’ll be alright, Rick?” and when he does he turns, and the world turns with him, and he’s stumbling and stumbling over his words like always, reassuring her.

“I’ll be- I’ll be fine, I’ll be fine. Don’t wanna be a bother.”

The angel in the doorway is a dark silhouette but he can still see her smile, the shine of white teeth encased in honeyed brilliance, a golden girl. 

She says, “Oh, you aren’t a bother,” and sounds like she means it and for one humiliating second he thinks he’s going to cry, right here on her driveway, standing in the light of her, the scraps of her sweetness––but he’s good, he’s fucking fine, he’s _Rick Dalton,_ he’s not gonna burst into tears in front of Sharon Tate like a fucking pansy and ruin the one good thing he’s found here and lose what little reputation he had left and be laughed out of Hollywood.

“Just– g– y’know, gotta be gettin’ home sometime,” he tries and sounds maybe not too strangled and tacks on a “thank you, ma’am” like he’s a twelve year old boy again going to church. Her smile is still there, doesn’t waver or dim, so he thinks maybe he’s fine.

“Come back sometime, we’d love to have you!”

She’s sincere, Rick knows that, and it’s exhilarating, like being loved, really loved, in a way that means something. Sharon Tate loves him, she loves everyone, god, she’s love personified. He waves and smiles the prettiest way he knows. The angelic silhouette waves gracefully back.

He walks down the driveway. Stumbles. Okay, he’s drunk, smashed, worse than when he walked over. The way is dark in front of him until it isn’t and the streetlamp is glaring overhead and everything is floaty in a way that was pleasant twenty minutes ago in Sharon Tate’s holy home and now feels the fuzzy side of wrong. It’s hot, his skin itching with sweat, and he’s scratching at the back of his neck where thick hair is slicked down, where he’s never had hair before.

He thinks vaguely about getting a haircut. Jay could maybe, he thinks, then laughs at himself, a little hysterical. His own fucking audicity, Jesus.

And then Rick’s on his own doorstep, familiar porch, drunk stumbling up the stone stairs. He sucks in a sharp breath and smoke fills his lungs––he’s got a cigarette in hand, which he doesn’t remember lighting but isn’t surprised by because it’s second nature by now.

He’s scratching his neck, pushing sweaty hair out of his face, and he’s itching for a dip in the pool, or a another drink, something cool; a bowl of water to pour over himself, or a shower, anything. He twists the door handle open, goes for the kitchen.

He trips over a sheet. “What the fuck?” he mumbles. The sheet is white, spread out over the ground and twisted up around his foot. The whiteness is disconcerting, too bright, clean, except for the big stain in the middle, splotches around it. Red. Bright, like the white, and dark, and human, and _red._

Oh shit. Fuck.

Police sirens come whistling into his mind, policemen and EMTs and bodies under sheets, ambulances and questions, “Sir, do you remember the time?” and “So you were in the pool? You didn’t see them come in?”.

“Fuckin’ hippies, shit.” He hasn’t forgotten, really, Jesus, who could forget that? But he hasn’t really been thinking about it. Wandered away from the scene when the cops finally let him go, away from his house and over to his neighbors’, got drunker than he already was, listened to music and talked and didn’t think about it. 

He finds himself looking around. The furniture is overturned and shoved around, things smashed. A power cord all the way across the floor. Everything is hazy and faintly wet-looking. There’s a dent in the wall. The air hangs heavy inside the house, smelling metallic and lingering in his mouth.

Blood, everywhere.

“ _Jesus_ Christ.” Rick’s _Tanner_ poster is shattered––actually the glass over it is shattered, the poster itself is barest crumpled underneath. There’s a spider web of cracks emanating from one, two places and the centers smeared dark. And the mantel, a stain on the edge. The wall, the coffee table, the carpet, in other spots not covered by a sanitized sheet. Stuff that might not be just blood. 

He moves for the kitchen. Remembers vaguely that he was heading there, but what for? He nearly trips over himself to avoid a patch on the floor, dark with blood and maybe not-just-blood. Rick recites every swear that comes to his head, repeats himself probably but he’s fucking allowed, _what the goddamn shit fucking fuck._

He’s at the sink, staring down at the empty blender and wondering how it got there when the phone rings. It’s loud, too loud, piercing through the death-stench of quiet in the room and the faint rush of pulse in his head. It vibrates against the wall, and as he watches, something is shaken off, slips down the handle and drops to the floor.

Rick stares. It’s dark, blood-dark, crimson and dense. It lands with a squelch. Solidly.

Something rises in his gut slowly, creeping up like poison. Not just blood; bits of muscle, pieces of bone, skin, fat and gristle, fucking god knows what else. There’s chunks, shit, all over the phone, and stuck in his _Tanner_ poster, and on the mantle. Chunks of person.

The phone is still ringing. 

He vomits on the kitchen floor.

*

“You’d never’ve survived the war.”

Cliff tells him this one evening, when they’re both drunk out of their minds, years ago. Rick can’t remember what prompted it, what conversation came before or after. He’s on the couch, the old one back at his old apartment, back before he bought the house on Cielo Drive, with its baby blue wallpaper and water-stained ceiling and ancient silver faucets. There’s the ever present smell of cheap beer in the carpet, and scripts all over the table.

He’s looking at Rick, glass of straight whiskey half-drained and resting on his chest as he reclines beside him. His eyes are half-lidded, and in the darkness, only shitty kitchen lights behind them over the couch, the curved scar on his forehead is pronounced. Rick still hasn’t asked how he got it. Cliff doesn’t talk about the war much.

“What’d you––what the fuck does tha’ mean?” he slurs back. “You sayin’ ‘m soft or some shit?”

Cliff shakes his head slowly, makes like he’s going to maybe sit up and then flops back onto the couch drunkenly. “No, no, nothin’ like that.”

He motions lazily at Rick, not noticing as he nearly spills his drink. “You’re just…” he trails off again, and Rick kicks at him to prompt him and misses by a mile.

“You’d never’ve made it, man. Jus’ too–– just don’t got the constitution. ‘S nothin’ personal. I knew plenty ’a guys who weren’t cut out for it, and they went.”

Rick remembers being offended at the time, the emasculating implication he wasn’t fit for war, the violence it entailed. His idea of war is what the movies tell him, uniformed men with guns shouting and running, enemies falling in swathes, the rattle of shells in the distance, music swelling during the final battle. He was a soldier, held a gun––not a real one, not a real soldier, but still. It counts for something, he thinks. Or it should.

*

Rick is staring out the window. The sun is beautiful, a feverish explosion over the sky as if it isn’t already hot as balls, fuschia and lavender ringing the edges of the sun’s immediate fire, pushing the indigo dark back. Warmth, the good kind that doesn’t feel suffocating and sticky, is pouring over the the already-there bad warmth, doubling on itself. Trees and rooftops and pavement light up, neon lights already flickered out. Everything is swaying slightly, moving in an invisible breeze, and as he notices it the air around him behind the glass becomes suddenly still.

He doesn’t think he’s ever seen a sunrise in Hollywood before. 

That thought occupies him for a long moment. He’s lived here for ten fucking years and he’s never seen the goddamn sunrise. He knows he can go through the list of reasons why, his mile-long TV catalogue of issues he’s barely begun to admit to, but the sun is on his face and he isn’t feeling anything for once and he lets his mind be blank. Soaks up the light like the primroses around his mother’s house during the summertime.

He’s detached. From his mind, his body, from the things around him; a window between still air and the breeze. It’s the weightless feeling, the one that’s not drunkenness, the one that scared him as a kid when he fell back out of it. Numbness. He welcomes it now.

Rick startles at the bark behind him.

Brandy is standing there as he turns, entirely unaffected by his undignified yelping. Champagne-colored gaze watches him smooth his shirt, tug at the waistline of his pants, uncaring of the tranquil atmosphere just burst like a bubble.

“Gonna give me– give me a goddamn heart attack, you will!” And his voice is booming, echoes in the newly-released air, and he remembers Francesca sleeping in the other room. It’s a lazy realization, a vague knowing without fully knowing, and he can’t even picture her in the room, his room, unstirring in her sleeping-pill coma and as thoroughly unfeeling of his presence as he is of hers.

Below him Brandy tilts her head innocently. She’s restless, actually, if she wasn’t so well-trained Rick thinks she’d be jumping up on him, making much more noise than just one bark. As it is, her body wriggles underneath her, skittering around him, pants audible as her jaw drops open. “What’s wrong? What’s wrong with you? You hungry or somethin’?” he mumbles. She’s pleading with him, shit, big animal eyes he’s always thought were too cute for such an intimidating dog. 

The cabinet has one dog food can left, _Wolf’s Tooth_ brand snarling at him from where it’s wedged behind some soup cans he doesn’t remember buying. Probably didn’t buy. 

“‘Lizard flavor’? You eat this shit?” he squints at Brandy, whose tail is wagging powerfully. She snuffles. He shrugs.

He thinks he should be queasy, watching the food––if it could be called that, _damn_ ––slide out of the can into a bowl for her in the corner of the kitchen, stained and old, but he’s still blissfully numb, and watches it splatter with indifference. She’s on it in less than a second, licking and slurping emphatically. It’s disgusting, but not really. He couldn’t care less.

Rick feels himself returning a little, watching Brandy, an active presence beside his own pulling him from where he is, watching his own life like it’s on a screen. Like little six year old him holding his frozen hands against the heater and feeling slowly coming back, or waking up from a long dream.

All at once, he can smell _everything_. “God, Jesus– fuckin’ Christ!” He gags, throws a hand up to cover his nose. But it’s all there now, the stale meatiness of the dog food, the acrid bile stench of his own vomit, the coppery blood now tinged with rot. He whirls around, retches into the sink, but nothing comes up. He spits saliva into the silver basin, hates the wetness of it.

He dry-heaves for what feels like hours, nausea rolling around his gut with nowhere to go. His stomach is cramping, tight and painful––when was the last time he ate? The vomit on the floor reminds him of last night’s Mexican, and the subsequent blender of alcohol, and fuck, he drank a lot. Drinks a lot. 

Rick refocuses; he can’t handle the true recognition of his alcoholism right now, not now, he needs something else to do, something physical to remind his body of where it belongs, because right now he’s hyper aware of it, can feel every twinge and twist and brush of dried-stiff clothes and too-long hair.

He cleans the house. 

He has no idea where the supplies are at first, has never cleaned more than the countertop before, has to go hunting, bangs cabinet doors and bumps his hip against the edge of things more than once because he’s still smelling everything and his hands and body refuse to steady. Windex and bleach are under the sink, there’s a broom in the corner of the pantry, towels are in an honest-to-god linen closet––who’s idea was that? He also finds a roll of paper towels jammed with the toilet paper rolls, slightly dented. 

First is the kitchen: it’s his mess, he can handle it. Brandy’s dog bowl gets tossed in the sink, and he mops up the watery, half-solid vomit with no little amount of complaining aloud as a distraction, a stream of stutter-stop words, to himself and Brandy and Cliff, who he’s been trying to avoid thinking about. 

Cliff is– well, Cliff is his buddy, his best friend, the guy he can’t live without. Rick doesn’t really ever think about all the shit Cliff does for him; can’t, or he’ll crumble under the weight of what he can’t even begin to repay. He good at that, the not-thinking.

But he can’t stop thinking about this, now that he’s talking to the idea of him; Cliff is laying in the hospital right now with a hole in his hip. He took a knife in the side and Rick can’t help but think it was for him. It’s shitty and narcissistic and he knows it, but––fuck, anyone else would’ve gotten the hell out of dodge, ditched the house as fast as possible and left any unsuspecting stragglers to fend for themselves. But Cliff stayed against all odds and got knifed for his troubles.

He’s thinking about Cliff and hospitals and loyalty and then he’s standing in the living room with a towel stained mahogany and an uncapped bottle of bleach. In front of him the carpet is lightened, a messy area of off-white on mustard. His stomach jolts violently. He swallows it down.

“Y–you fuckin’ wimp,” he mutters to himself, “Is cleanin’– cleanin’ really so goddamn hard? Huh? Can’t handle a little blood? You’ve used a flamethrower before– fuck, you incinerated a chick!” 

And then he’s on the floor, kneeling over another stain that could almost be red wine if he didn’t know better, but he does know better and he’s not a goddamn baby, he’ll clean the damn blood up, call it what it is. Faintly, he can feel his arm burning as he scrubs, furious at himself and furious at the police for not cleaning this up or _doing something,_ and enraged at those _dirty goddamned fucking hippies_ for coming here in the first place.

His _Tanner_ poster he wipes clean, harshly at first and then more carefully when glass shards tinkle down over his hands. He leaves it where it hangs, shattered and with two holes in the glass casing tinged rosy at the edges. One’s over his hand, that hole, and the other’s over his boot where it’s propped, foot turned out. His cartoonish face, stupid smirk and cowboy squint, looms fractured. Further down, the mantle actually has a dent in it, Jesus, but the color comes completely off with a little bleach, unnoticeable on the white stones. And what the hell, the coffee table has a hairline fracture in the center of the heavy wood.

The phone he puts off for last. He does everything else; rearranges furniture, brushes away glass, runs water over Brandy’s bowl in the sink until the newest remnants of dog food are gone, wipes down the kitchen counters again. There’s nothing else to do, finally.

“Don’t be such a little bitch.” He picks up the towel. His hands are rubbed raw, skin peeling back at the joints. 

Valiantly he avoids paying attention to what he’s picking up with the cloth under his hands, itty bitty pieces of things that are too hard and too sharp to think about fully. Nausea churns unpleasantly. He runs the towel in the sink and comes back dripping water to wipe down the last of it, and the cold wet of it stings his pink hands.

Rick discards the towel. Sighs.

Looks around.

The house is clean. There’s obvious splotches of bleached carpet, and there’s dents where there wasn’t before, and his poster is smashed, but it’s clean. He’s no longer in a crime scene, or a crisis. No longer surrounded by human debris.

He doesn’t think about the pool outside, doesn’t open the door. Doesn’t smell the lingering ash or burnt flesh. The house is clean. That’s what matters.

His muscles burn in a satisfying way he’s been missing lately. The euphoria, simple joy of finishing a task and the more jarring release from the horror he’s been trapped in, fills him like a goddamn balloon. He’s riding high as he shoves the cleaning supplies back where they belong. Brandy pokes her head out from the hallway, where she’s taken refuge from the overwhelming scent of bleach, and he’s kneeling, arms open, and she’s bounding on top of him and they’re rolling around, play wrestling, and he’s breathless and happy and alive.

He realizes he’s laughing. The press of a body on top of him is grounding, dog breath on his face moist and hot. His nose is full of bleach and it’s not blood or vomit or booze, and he inhales deeply, dizzy with chemicals and whiplash happiness.

Rick coughs. “Damn, need a cigarette,” he grumbles. Brandy licks his face.

He’s still smiling as he pushes her off, goes for the carton in his back pocket. It’s crushed and so is the cig he puts in his mouth.

“What do we– we do now, huh?” She slumps onto her ass in front of him as he pulls his legs into a cross, and ow, dammit, he’s stiffer than he wants to be. He contemplates her, wonders what it is Cliff usually does with her.

Cliff.

He exhales smoke over his left shoulder. “How about we go visit him? You wanna visit him? You wanna visit your dad?” he asks. Her tail thumps the floor hard. He agrees.

“Alright, let’s go visit your dad. He said– said to bring bagels so that’s what we’re gonna do. That’s what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna bring him bagels.”

*

“Any idea– any idea what time, uh, hospitals open?” 

The taxi driver doesn’t return his gaze in the rear view mirror. Doesn’t know who he is, or doesn’t care––a driver in Hollywood, who the hell knows what kinda shit he’s seen from people more famous than him. Rick drums his fingertips along his leg, breathes smoke out the open window. A greasy wrap bag of four bagels with egg and cheese from the gas station sits innocuously next to him on the fake leather seats.

“You’ve got another half hour, man. Hospital don’t open ‘til at least eight.”

“Shit.” He takes a steadying breath. His bones are humming, every part of him jittery, nerves on the fritz as the car takes a sharp turn right. Cars and city blur past, glinting pointed sunlight that fills his sight with little flashes of bright white. His head hurts, maybe, he can’t tell right now, isn’t focused.

Godammit, he’s hung over. He sucks a little harder on the cig. He hates being hung over, usually wakes up still half drunk or is getting there by the time he’s stopped yawning. He knows the remedies; cold water and coffee and fried food and egg yolks and other nasty shit, and drugs, of course, drugs so he could be high instead of hung over, but drugs are like drinks and there’s always the after, when he has to come down, and god, he’s tired of it.

His mind wanders back to his house, under guard of Brandy who he wishes were here now. He’d like to rub her ears, feel her short fur and smell her dog-smell which he’s been familiar with and now grown accustomed to. Wants––wants something, when does he not, greedy asshole that he is.

And then he’s at the hospital.

*

According to the clock, he sits in the cold, dreary, boring ass waiting room for thirty four minutes. It feels like fucking hours, but god knows he can’t guess time for shit, lacks the awareness of the passage of it that most people have at least in some capacity. 

Rick’s an actor, he’s never claimed to be a genius. He grew up being charming and cute and when the baby fat finally melted away and he stopped looking like someone’s kid brother, handsome. His face is what gets him his jobs, and his talent is what lets him keep them.

Okay, that’s a fat fucking lie. Whatever.

At two minutes past eight exactly––there’s a clock, he’s gonna look at it––they finally let him into Cliff’s room with the politely aggressive warning to not disturb him while he’s asleep. And Cliff’s fucking out.

He’s a light sleeper, Rick knows, from the war and the cops and whatever else his mysterious past contains that makes him the way he is, so the fact that he doesn’t even twitch when Rick approaches, not even when he brushes his fingers on his bare arm––yeah, they’ve got Cliff on the good stuff.

Something wells up inside him, bright and sharp, at the sight of Cliff in the hospital bed, pale under the fluorescent lights, hair tucked under his head, body laid out flat stiff. He looks oddly deflated in that hospital gown and the thin sheet, body big in the frame of the narrow bed yet still dwarfed by all the sanitized white, tubes and shit on racks around him, one trailing down into the back of his hand. Rick’s never seen him stiff, not like this; he’s seen him tensed and muscles flexing, he’s seen him passed out boneless, but not like this. Not like a fucking corpse. 

There’s a plastic chair and he yanks it up to the bed, sits in it, marvels at the sheer discomfort. He’s pretty sure the bagels are cold by now. They’re deposited on the floor next to him, waiting patiently to be eaten. The chemical smell of too much disinfectant isn’t exactly encouraging his appetite––he hates hospitals, the smell and white of them, avoids them at all costs. He’s never visited Cliff before, all the times he’s gotten injured stunting, and Cliff has never said anything about it, never asked him to come.

He props his elbows up on the thin chair arms and leans forward. Traces Cliff’s familiar features with his eyes: strong, carved––straight nose and sharp brows, the faint scratch of stubble and grooves where his face wrinkles as it moves, and, unavoidable, that fucking jawline. The little scar along the underneath the jut of his chin that Rick knows is from a bad fall on set. The faded, hook-shaped one below his hairline, a mystery.

Rick knows this face, knows it well, could see it with his eyes closed. He’s been with this guy for years, god, he barely remembers his life without him, a dim haze of childhood and a few odd jobs before he made it, landed _Bounty Law_ and met Cliff and became something. Changed his life––no, fuck it, _began living._

He’s thinking about meeting Cliff, that first time, on set, both in cowboy gear and Cliff’s easy grin, the large hand around his and “I’m Cliff Booth, your new stunt double”, the immediate chemistry and the little voice in Rick’s head that went “this guy’s something special” and––

And his neck hurts like a bitch and the plastic hospital chair is digging into his spine and he looks up and Cliff’s eyes are open, watching him, amusement curling in the corners of his face. 

“Hey–hey buddy, I’m sorry for fallin’ asleep, uh, how’re you feelin’?” He’s talking too fast, Cliff’s blinking slow and still just watching him, quiet. “I brought bagels, y’know, like y’said you wanted, you said– you said y’wanted bagels in the ambulance and I–I got some here,” and fucking Christ he needs to shut up, nerves frying, insides quavery from the hang over and his usual mess of feelings he’ll never begin to parse and would rather pretend isn’t there but can’t because they do shit like this, make him feel nervous talking to _Cliff_ of all people.

It is with the utmost relaxation that Cliff cranes his head and Rick holds up the grease-stained bag to show him. 

“Sure looks like y’did,” he drawls. He blinks again, eyes closed for a full beat before he meets Rick’s gaze again. Muscled arms flex at his sides, rippling under tanned skin. Cliff sits up, sleepily shoves the pillows against the wall, leans back and deflates into them.

“How are you feelin’?” Rick tries again. 

“Uh, pretty good.” He huffs a laugh. “The nurses are real nice, if you know what I mean.” 

Rick snorts. “They–th–they’ve got you pretty doped up, huh?” Cliff gives him a satisfied nod, and the heavy ball at the pit of his stomach begins to––maybe not lessen, but loosen, roll out of the deepest pressure points and onto lighter ground.

“Let’s, uh,” Cliff glances up at him from under short lashes, “see those bagels, then.” And the easy, simple companionship between them is good, it’s––really good. Yeah. 

They eat the room temperature bagels––“I swear, they were hot when I bought them”––and get crumbs in the hospital bed, Cliff with clumsy, IV-tight hands, and Rick leaning towards him over the sheets, both glancing towards the door occasionally because Rick doesn’t know the rules around here but he’s pretty sure Cliff’s not supposed to be eating greasy food in bed fresh out of being stabbed.

He informs him about Brandy: at his house, fed, only one can, yeah she’s a sweetheart, no, he won’t go spoiling her. Cliff seems relieved, and Rick revels in the rare feeling of dependability.

The surgery was no problem, eleven stitches, Cliff tells him, and they get stab patients plenty ‘round here. City of dreams, he says sardonically. Apparently, they would release him today but because he was tripping balls during the stabbing and managed to also fuck up his back––“When, uh, one of the hippies tackled me over the table.” “What– how the fuck?”–– they’re keeping him for observation an extra twenty-four hours. Cliff seems unperturbed.

He’s wincing though, face pulling tight and body tensing as he shifts, and Rick tries not to watch because he’s never really seen Cliff in pain before, not visibly, not when he’s always so casual in that controlled, guarded way, and he can feel the second-hand embarrassment, the shame of vulnerability, that ugly nakedness he knows only too well.

Oh fuck, _Cliff._

Face burning, choking, and dammit he’s crying, fucking _blubbering,_ can’t control his tongue, holding Cliff’s free hand between his own and gripping tightly; he doesn’t really know what he’s saying beyond repeating ‘thank you, thank you’ over Cliff’s “woah, okay” because he needs him to understand his gratitude, for _everything,_ and Cliff’s thumb twitches under his fingers and then the hand is pulling away, fuck, _no_ ––rejection burns and panic overtakes him because he needs this, and Cliff’s hand tugs out of his sweaty, grasping ones and then it’s sliding up his bare forearm, stroking him like he’s calming a horse and relief is sweeping through him and he’s still crying, head bowed low over the bedsheet until his vision is just dull off-white.

It’s pathetic. It’s fucking humiliating, is what it is. But Cliff isn’t pushing him away, isn’t quieting him, just touching him gentle and quiet as he sobs, as if _he_ has any right to be crying right now when he’s perfectly fine, not stabbed or anything. Body heat radiates beside Rick’s forehead, and it’s Cliff’s body heat, Cliff’s body, warm and alive.

There’s a long moment of that, then Rick’s sitting up and scrubbing his face and pulling out a carton. Cliff still hasn’t said anything, usually doesn’t when Rick gets this way unless it’s in public where it would hurt him, and it’s just one more thing for Rick to be grateful for.

Smoke fills his lungs, pooling calm into him. He sighs out and offers one to Cliff, who’s just grabbed one when a nurse busts in, pitchy voice yelling about “no smoking in the hospital!” and “if you can’t follow the rules you’ll have to leave!” and she yanks the cigarette right out of Cliff’s grip and into the trash.

She shepards Rick forcefully out, but not before he manages to press a couple more cigs into Cliff’s waiting palm and sees him tuck them into the sheets. He gets out a short farewell over his shoulder and then he’s on the curb, awaiting another taxi to take him home.

*

There’s a suitcase right inside the door as he walks in. He stops, looks at it, recognizes it––from somewhere. It’s one of those high quality ones, white and boxy, and catching the noon light falling in through the door it glows a little, edges blurring. A grunt, the tug of fabric, and clattering of something heavy and solid against a surface pulls his gaze up into the house, pulse speeding up. His bedroom door is ajar, and there’s the back half of Brandy sticking out of it, stop-motion tail wagging, stilling, wagging, stilling. Okay, not some psycho hippies again.

Over the sound of the lingering cab idling behind him: unintelligible muttering, a foreign but familiar cadence––Italian, and it’s Francesca, bent back towards him as he approaches, slender arms reaching around and grabbing things, shoving them into the suitcase in front of her. One that matches the one by the door.

“You’re leavin’?”

His voice is incredulous, surprise muffling everything else at the moment. She turns to him, face flickered wild before it shutters, wide eyes narrowing at him and brows comically furrowed. She’s all done up and ready to go, hair elaborately pulled back and make-up applied, ready to walk out the fucking door. At his feet, Brandy’s pacing a little, head jerking around as she watches them.

“Yes, I am,” Francesca tells him, heavy accent rising, “They lied about America. It is nothing like ‘ow they said. Hollywood is nothing ‘ow they said, too violent and _orribile!”_ and she’s talking about ‘dangerous’ and ‘crazy bitches with knives’ and going through her list of greivances; insulting Hollywood, insulting the fucking airport, insulting everything, insulting his goddamn house which she’d liked so much just yesterday, and Rick is trying to calm her, hands up, repeating “okay, okay, calm down honey,” as she falls into Italian babble, but she won’t stop, turning her back on him and tossing things frantically into her suitcase and he’s getting _pissed._

“So you’re–you’re just gonna, fuckin’ what? Leave? You can’t– you’re my wife, what is everyone gonna say when my goddamn wife– shit, runs out on me? Fuck!” His mind is filling with condescending looks, snide comments, even more fucking pity, shit he can’t stand. That can’t happen. Cannot. Fucking. Happen.

Francesca whirls around, face tight, says, “You are nothing ‘ow they said either! No big American hero.” She runs a hand through her perfectly combed hair, looking frazzled, as if she’s the one getting fucking betrayed. Rick doesn’t hear his response, drowned out by the wave of blood in his ears, but she isn’t reacting to it, ignoring him and slamming her bag shut and rising. 

“This was a mistake!” she yells at him and he’s following her into the hallway as she walks by, small vicious pleasure in her struggling to heave her bag along, staggering slightly under the weight of it, bottom thudding unevenly along the floor, and she whips her head back to glare at him. 

“This was a mistake! America was a mistake!” Somewhere behind them there’s barking. He thinks he makes a grab for her, but can’t really tell, doesn’t know what his body does when he’s raging, and she’s still walking towards the fucking door unhindered. 

“A mistake? A mistake? Huh? Was–was this– was I also a mistake? Our goddamn marriage a mistake?” He shouts, chest heaving, pulse heavy in his throat. He wants to smash something, punch something or someone, grab her by her skinny wrists or her fluffy, overworked hair and–-fuck, do _something,_ something angry and forceful to get her to fucking stop and listen to him.

“Yes you were!” She spits savagely, and he’s had it.

The world goes hazy, his head spinning, and he catches his breath long enough to roar, scream at her, “Then _leave! Fuckin’ get out!_ Get out! Go back to your shitty goddamn country! Go! _Get out! Get fuckin’ out!”_

He can’t see much anymore, vision blurring. The door’s being yanked open, and the world fades for a second as he turns towards the bar, hands itching, and he thinks maybe he’s shaking. There’s a crash and Francesca’s letting out a little yelp, flash of motion disappearing behind the closing door, and he can’t breathe and there’s another crash, and another, and outside there’s the distant squeal of tires, and inside the barking is still going.

*

Later, some undetermined time, as he lays on the floor drunk, he realizes he’s not surprised. He thinks he should’ve been, and maybe he was a little at first, but deep down he’s not. Married in a quaint, crumbling little Roman Catholic chapel covered in delicate white flowers after knowing each other for the span of little over two months and fucking for nearly all of it––probably not the best idea. Rick doesn’t even know quite why he asked her. Okay, he does, kind of. 

Doesn’t want to admit it. Can’t admit it. 

How fucking sad.

He’s numb again, the kind he’s terrified of––still is, not just when he was a kid, he’s tired enough to admit that now–– and cold even in a puddle of afternoon sun, breathing chemicals off the carpet. He can see the dust particles in the air, floating gently through the suspended light. The house is quiet now, unnaturally still, like the aftermath of a storm; everything lying motionless, shards of hand-painted ceramic scattered across the room, strips of wallpaper hanging where they’re peeling back from the wall, furniture overturned, his body on the floor. He’d thrown those new collectible cups, the ones he’d brought back all the way from Italy with little drawings of his face on them, his scrawled signature, as well as several brandy glasses, all now in pieces against the wall.

He’s hollowed out. He’s spent so long thrashing about, thrown into the pool before he learned to swim, years of twisting his body and gasping for air, reaching for something to hold onto; spent years of his life trying to stay afloat and not quite making it. His muscles ache and he’s still drowning, at the end of. 

It’s not Francesca leaving, not really, not at its core, or maybe it is, just only the ‘leaving’ part. Another rejection. They’ve been adding up for years now, rejections and “no thanks” and parts cut and shows cancelled and people needing something more, something less, needing him to tone it down, calm down, act like the man he is in front of the camera like anyone in front of the camera is an _actual fucking person._ He’s in goddamn Hollywood; there are no real people here. 

And then the shit with the hippies, and Cliff in the hospital, and, well––he doesn’t think he can get up from this.

*

He can’t stop reaching for the surface though, is the thing. Can’t force his body still. 

Drowning but not drowned. He gets up. 

Makes himself a drink. Turns on the TV and doesn’t watch it. Brandy whines at his feet and he looks up and the sun’s gone down. He gets up. Gives Brandy some old hamburger meat from the freezer. Sits back down in front of the TV and drinks. Smokes. Doesn’t fall asleep, or maybe he does. He can’t tell.

In the middle of all that numb there’s lingering anger, like feeling around behind a wall and touching an exposed wire. He’s sparking, raging one second and dead again the next. He curls his hands into fists and the raw, pink skin of his hands burn, then he punches a wall and splits his knuckles open.

It’s nothing like the movies; it hurts like a motherfucker and there’s a vicious crack, for a second he thinks he’s managed to fucking break his hand but no. He howls in pain, swears colorfully, eyes watering viciously. Brandy watches him stumble around, cradling his hand in the crook of his left arm, looking like a fucking idiot and feeling like one, too.

“W–what’re you starin’ at? What’re you starin’ at?” he snarls at her. She gazes up at him from her spot on the floor placidly. 

He’s been talking to her more now, in the hours––days?––since she got left here, rambling about fuck all, making comments and asking questions like she’ll respond. A fucking dog. 

“Shit, I really am losing my mind,” he mutters drunkenly from where he’s splayed across his leather couch. Brandy huffs a little breath and turns her head, and yeah, that’s confirmation enough.


	2. plunge or mercy. i deserve both.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cliff comes home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here we go! this should've been up sooner––not gonna give excuses though. when i read all your sweet comments i deadass started crying. is there a reason i picked rick to project on? maybe but it's none of your business
> 
> but honestly the feedback has been so good though!!!! it makes all the time spent checking dates and looking up weirdly specific stuff worth it! 
> 
> content warning for this chapter: very minor mention of self-harm in the form of an intrusive thought

I like to call myself wound  
but I will answer to knife. Sometimes  
I think we have the same name, Notquitelove. I want  
to be soft, to say here is my underbelly and I want you  
to hold the knife, but I don’t know what I want you to do:  
plunge or mercy. I deserve both. I want to hold and be held. 

— Nicole Homer, from “Underbelly,” published in Poem-a-Day

*

He goes to see Cliff again. He’s going to get bagels, down at the gas station on the corner, and someone is staring at him, a young guy wearing a leather jacket and shock. Rick’s hand flies up to his face automatically, wondering what the fuck. The guy’s stare flicks to something next to him. 

He turns and there’s a newspaper stand, and a headline shouting “WOULD-BE ATTACKERS KILLED IN ACTORS HOME” and “‘Jake Cahill’ Saved by Stunt Double” and a goddamn picture of him, slightly out of focus still of him from the last season of _Bounty Law,_ six years ago looking dignified atop a horse. And he’s walking out without the bagels, or the cigarettes, and shouting at the taxi driver to _go, fuckin’ go!_ and his heart is pounding for far too long afterwards.

The nurse’s face as he walks in tells him he must look a picture, so he shoves into the bathroom and looks himself in the mirror. Under the dim, shitty lighting he’s washed out, pale and simultaneously flushed, sweat beading under his floppy, unkempt hair, eyes puffy and sunken cheeks covered in patchy stubble. 

Jesus Christ. He looks godawful. 

Rick splashes water in his face, runs his fingers through his hair, tousles it––which only makes the greasy strands more obvious––ignoring the stinging of his fucked up hands. He straightens his shirt, wishing he’d gone with that shower instead of just a change of clothes. His mouth is dry. He runs his tongue over his teeth, itching for a drink or a cigarette, but a grab at his pockets reminds him he didn’t buy any.

“I’m only s’posed to be in here another hour and you’re visiting me again? Way to make a guy feel special,” Cliff says as he walks in, and Rick does a double take because that means it’s noon and he thought it was still morning––or, actually, he hasn’t really been thinking about it, but the reminder of the passage of time disconcerts him. Shit.

Cliff looks better, looks like himself again, the way he quirks his brows as Rick slumps into the chair and says, “What, visiting me that bad?” and curling the words in vague amusement, like he couldn’t give less of a shit but wants to see a reaction. There’s real scruff on his jaw now, his eyes are clearer, skin less ashen, the IV’s gone and he’s moving again, response time less like an old film reel and more like the guy Rick knows.

Rick doesn’t take the bait. He’s still underwater, still out of breath, embers of rage floating around the dark, and being mad is easy but being mad at Cliff is hard most days, impossible when he’s laying wasting away in a hospital bed, so the embers are out and he’s left with just the dark. 

“Francesca left.”

And for once he’s not overflowing with words, pulling them out of his mouth in a jumble; he mumbles it and shuts up. 

“Back to Italy?”

“Yeah.”

They talk about other things after that, but apart from a nurse coming in and telling Cliff he can finally get the hell out, this is the only one that means anything. Cliff tells him, “I’m sorry, partner,” as if it’ll make anything better, but somehow it does, because he says it low and sincere and his hand is on Rick’s arm again, and Rick feels something in him calm at the touch, like it’s something he’s been missing and didn’t know it. Cliff asks him a few questions and he doesn’t cry, though his throat burns and it takes some comment from Cliff, a lazy joke about nothing important, before he can soften the pinch of his face.

It makes him realize something, as he watches Cliff watch him, smile casual but eyes careful, that Cliff really fucking _matters_ to him. 

And that not-thinking he’s so good at fails him suddenly; Rick’s aware, fully and awfully, how he’s keeping his body angled towards him, knees pointed and shoulders hunched as he leans forward, waiting for the sound of Cliff’s measured voice, his firm assurance. Even in a hospital bed Cliff is a pillar upright, unwavering strength that Rick, for some unknown reason, gets to lean on, and he hopes this all doesn’t show on his face because for all that he’s studied himself in the mirror he has no idea what this looks like.

He sounds like a teenage girl, Jesus, but it’s deeper than that. Cliff is his brother, more than a brother, his closest friend. His double, his shadow, always there like a second skin, another version of him where things went differently– not better or worse than his own life, just another life, now hopelessly entwined with his own. He hasn’t left him. 

And here’s the thing: Rick needs Cliff. It’s not pretty, it’s actually fucking terrifying, the magnitude of him that rests on Cliff’s broad shoulders. It’s fucked up, and twisted, too desperate to be––

Well, anything good.

*

There’s a cigarette in his hand. Smoke twists from the lit end, a bright orange circle that looks like a tiny setting sun, if the sun crumbled instead of sank; it’s resting maybe an inch from his thumb and for a moment he thinks about pressing that burning circle into it, pressing the fire into his skin, the little soft patch under the calluses, and then there’s a hush of motion beside him and the thought slips away. 

It’s Cliff who’s moving, rolling his shoulders back and leaning an arm against the rim of the open taxi window. Late afternoon sun blazes down on his exposed arm, tan skin glowing and watch catching reflections, and his shaded face is its usual calm but there’s something restless in it, silent agitation watching the world go by. Rick wants to dismiss it––who the fuck knows what’s going on behind those sunglasses?––but he’s responding to it, fingers twitching around his cigarette, wondering what’s up and what he has to do with it. 

Cliff turns his head, wind whipping his hair behind his ear, and he’s just staring at him unreadably and Rick’s wondering what Cliff can see of his face beyond his own glasses– they’re keeping a low profile, as much as Rick’s ego puffs up at being recognized there’s an ugly twist in his gut when he sees people watching him now; they’re not seeing an actor, they’re seeing the bloodbath in all caps on the front page and he hates it, pisses him off and makes him want to hide in his house and never come out––then the corner of Cliff’s mouth jumps up and his whole face goes warm and Rick’s heart rate is going back down, fingers mostly stilling.

Cliff doesn’t say anything, turns his face back to the window, and Rick has to admire the crazy bastard. He was still pale under the white fluorescents as they left but out here, in the sunlight, color’s bleeding back into his edges––already bouncing back. Rick’s impressed. Hasn’t got a clue in hell what the expected recovery time is, no idea whether that’s actually impressive, but there’s something about Cliff that makes it feel remarkable.

Maybe it’s his easy confidence, or the rumbled cadence of his voice, or the set of his shoulders and the curve of his jaw which is a vision of self-contained power, the kind you see in exotic pets, the ones you know are just humoring you and haven’t actually been tamed and become any less dangerous. 

There are times Cliff’s eyes snap over to him and Rick feels like he’s one of those owners, sitting next to a python or a tiger and wondering if the charade’s up. Then he blinks and Cliff’s a person again, and he feels a little stupid and a little afraid.

This taxi stops at the bottom of the hill like an asshole, and as soon as Rick’s slapped the money in his hand the driver is gone, like the place is fucking haunted or some shit. It’s hot enough that the tar is melting slightly and the smell of it hovers in the air, like the olfactory counterpart of the wet-looking heat waves radiating off the pavement. Rick feels like he’s baking, skin heating up and crumbling off.

As the sound of tires screaming against loose gravel disappears, Cliff says, “Well, there goes my ride home,” and the ringing in his ears that he thought was the car is still here.

Rick twists to look at him and “What are you talkin’ about?” comes out before he fully processes what exactly Cliff said. 

His head is spinning, now, heat hammering into his bones. Everything shimmers around him and the sun is growing brighter overhead every second. Cliff’s form sways a little.

“You’re not– you’re not goin’ back to that shitty trailer, you’ve–you’re– just out the hospital,” Rick points towards what he’s pretty sure is Cliff, which sharpens from the bluish blur it was to reveal his mouth making an indecipherable line below his glasses. “You’re stayin’. Right here, Cliff. You’re stayin’ right here. I got plenty ‘a room for you.”

“You sure, buddy?” he asks, and his hair catches the wind, blowing golden behind him, and Rick’s vaguely nauseous.

He nods firmly. “Brandy’s been waitin’ for you.”

Cliff says, “Alright,” easily, and maybe smiles but Rick can’t tell because things have gotten shimmery again. “But I’ll have to go home anyways, get some stuff.”

“Sounds good, sounds good.” Rick mumbles, already moving towards the hill.

*

He swings open the door and lets it knock heavy into the wall, echo slamming through the house and his skull, smells the bleach radiating up out of the room; and then Brandy’s bounding up to him, barking what he’s decided is a happy sound, and he kneels to greet her and then the weight of Brandy’s body hits him and he’s–– 

Flat on his back, staring up at the rough textured ceiling. He sits up, strangely light, propped by the heels of his hands and looking down at his shirt. No Brandy. Huh.

“I thought I was the one straight out of the hospital.”

Cliff is standing over him. His sunglasses are gone––Rick can see the pinch of his brows. Past him, Brandy is on the couch, body rising like she wants to stand, watching him intently, and when did she get over there?

There’s a hand in front of his face and he takes it, Cliff’s grunted “Careful, buddy,” hitting his jaw as he’s pulled up, fast, and the world takes a second to stop spinning. Proximity is here, a body brushing his, for one moment and then Cliff is stepping back, giving him space.

“Sorry, sorry about that, old buddy, I don’t– don’t quite know what happened.” Rick tells him, slight remaining dizziness leaving him feeling misplaced. Cliff claps his back.

The heavy hand presses against his shoulder blade, grounding, and Rick kind of wants to reach up and hold it there. “Looks to me like you blacked out for a few seconds.” 

And he fucking did. He can remember his vision going black, or can at least imagine it––what’s the difference anymore? Sees in third person himself, on one knee, falling back as Brandy jumps into his arms, Cliff stepping into the doorway behind him as his body hits the carpet.

Only Cliff’s touch on his back stops him from falling into an ugly, gut-dropping twist of upset. The hand lingers, briefly, then slips down and away and Cliff moves over to the couch, letting Brandy hop down. Rick sees him assess the room, eyes lingering over the shattered _Tanner_ poster, the overturned coffee table, the spotty carpet. Hears him sniff, toe the carpet in front of him where it bleeds lighter.

“I, uh, got rid of the––of the blood.” Rick tells him, ignoring the shattered pieces of cup across the room, shards crunching underfoot. Cliff makes a show of looking around in exaggerated appreciation, nodding to himself as if the room isn’t still a disaster, as if he doesn’t recognize the hallmarks of Rick having a breakdown.

“Not bad.” He shoots Rick a side-eye. “Sorry about your poster.”

“That was you?” Rick is outraged. He thought that was one of the fucking hippies, not his good, long-time pal Cliff Booth who's _supposed_ to be protecting his shit, not destroying it.

Cliff chuckles and says, “Yeah, that was me. Mantel was me, too. And the phone.” His grin is bright in the dusky shade of the unlit living room, smug bastard. He shrugs his shoulders, pats the resting head of Brandy, who’s curled back up on the couch, apparently now convinced everything is fine, and moves over to the phone with a little limp Rick had noticed earlier in the hospital, as they walked down those white miserable halls, past the front desk, and into the taxi. There’s a barely-there jolt in Rick’s stomach.

“I see you got all the hippie face off it though, nice job.” 

And that jolt is definitely there, and there to stay, ricocheting around inside him, and he feels uncomfortably warm. He’s nauseous again for what feels like the hundredth time, like it’s never actually left.

“That’s– that’s what that was?” he asks weakly. Cliff laughs at him.

“Nothing compared to what you did with the flamethrower. Yeah, I heard about that little stunt in the ambulance.” The heat rises, and despite the lingering pit of his gut Rick’s grinning now too because, yeah, he’s a little proud of that. 

Rick _fucking_ Dalton.

They settle in the kitchen, Cliff leaning his left hip––the uninjured one––into the counter edge and folding his arms. Rick keeps thinking he’s going to ask something, some question about all this. What they’re gonna do now. But he doesn’t, just burns down a cigarette between his lips then goes and checks the fridge.

“Think ‘mma go pick up th’ car. Y’ gonna need ‘nything?” he asks around the last of the cig, then stubs out the butt in the ceramic ashtray on the counter, the vintage collectable one Rick had gotten from one of the _Bounty Law_ producers on his 30th birthday. And it’s a familiar question, he’s heard it a million times before, but he feels a little bad now, Cliff just back from the hospital and already doing shit for him again like nothing’s wrong. Like he hadn’t said goodbye in Italy, basically told him to fuck off. But that was before–– well, before.

“You gonna drive, you– drive yourself? The doctors clear you for that?” 

“Aw, what they don’t know won’t hurt them. ‘Sides, they said no _straining_ physical activity,” Cliff jingles the car keys in his pocket, “and I’d hardly call driving ‘straining’.”

And Rick can’t argue with that, so he shrugs and tells Cliff they’re almost out of lemons, which Cliff already knows, and eggs, which Cliff also already knows, and paper towels, which Cliff doesn’t already know, and makes him raise an eyebrow, but he doesn’t ask, and Rick doesn’t tell him to check the trash where an entire roll of individually crumpled wads are covered in blood and other nasty shit.

He fumbles around the kitchen as Cliff calls another cab until he finds a wad of cash, smoothes out a couple of twenties and hands them over, the SOP for groceries since Cliff started running all his errands. Cliff dips his head, shoves the bills and a lighter in his pocket. Grabs another few cigarettes off the coffee table. Rick feels guilty or some shit; wants, all of a sudden, to stop him and keep him here in the house but that’s stupid, he needs his car back and some damn food around here, and he stays where he is behind the kitchen bar.

“Alright, I’ll be back in a bit.”

*

Rick’s got a history of being driven around. 

He can remember being a kid and riding shotgun with his dad, back before he went off to war, down the old highways and side roads, needle swinging around speedometer, trees and snow and buildings going by until the rush became a tunnel and the world disappeared. 

His dad had been a reckless driver, nearly disqualified from the draft because of a slight limp from a bad crash, back before Rick could walk. Maybe it was a good thing that his dad hadn’t been the one to teach him––not that it had helped, in the end. He doesn’t have his license anymore, crashed and scraped and dented every car he’s ever had, never paid attention to the right things or looked into the right mirrors.

The way Cliff drives is like his dad, in a way––tires squealing, playing loose and fast with traffic laws, peeling out of the driveway like he’s making a getaway every time––but Rick’s a firm believer that a man’s driving is like his fingerprint, no one identical. Being in the car with Cliff feels different, the rush without the loss of sensation, like even as the car swerves it’s carefully controlled. Cliff’s got patience, despite how he lets the neon signs blur when they’re driving home, which his dad lacked.

In a way, he feels safer with Cliff, who drives him everyday, everywhere. Cliff, who sits with him through L.A. traffic, quiet or joking depending and always steadfast. Cliff, who went to war and came back.

*

Laughter rings through the air, high cackling from Cliff and low chortles from himself. He squints at the glow of the TV through the haze, stupidly entertained by the sight of Don Adams urgently attempting to whistle Yankee Doodle through a mouthful of cracker. 

“Fuckin’ idiot!” Rick shouts at the screen, delighted. The weight on his thigh eases as Brandy lifts her head to peer up at him, eyes pale orange in the low light. The kitchen lights are off and it’s dark outside, windows shut for privacy, completing the bubble of atmosphere, murky warmth gathering in the circle of light made by the TV over the couch. Lemon and alcohol twists in the air, sour mixing with sharp and the greasy hungry smell of pizza, and underneath it all the heady musk of home, leather and cigarette smoke. He feels warm and untouchable, like every bad thing is out beyond the window while he’s safe here.

Beside him, Cliff falls back against the stiff cushions, snickering softly as the guy on the screen mistakes the airborne crumbs for snow, and Brandy shifts her leg to avoid him, flops her head back on Rick’s lap, tail lazily whipping Cliff’s arm. He shakes his head, pushes his fingers through his hair, and goes for the beer. “The earlier episodes were the best.”

“Damn straight. Actually, I think there’s, uh, another season coming this fall.” Rick tells him, accepting the beer that’s passed to him. Cliff glances at him before returning his gaze to the screen.

“Yeah? How many’s that now?”

“It’ll make four– no, five, seasons, yeah. Five seasons.”

“Huh. Not bad.” Cliff takes a deep inhale, pushes more smoke into the air in front of them. The TV screen gets hazier, the bubble tighter. “Not a bad run at all.”

“Sure, sure, yeah.” Rick mutters, now thinking of _Bounty Law,_ and he knows he’s scowling. The atmosphere falters.

Yeah, he’s still mad. Only four seasons, fucking bullshit producers cancelled because of the _declining_ quality, as if that was his fault, the blame on his shoulders when the writing was shit. “Just get some new fuckin’ writers!” he’d said, but by then it was too goddamn late apparently, they’d already run the whole-ass thing into the ground.

The beer sours in his mouth. Cliff must notice, shoots him another look as his head tips back, throat working as he drinks, but he doesn’t say anything, not until the episode is over. Rick’s leg is bouncing as the ads start rolling, perky chatter and cheerful tunes, and he’s only half paying attention, seeping in bitterness. 

Cliff’s throwing back the last of the beer and then the TV’s off, quiet pouring over them, solid, barely jostled by the creaking of springs and clothing sliding against leather. He stands, and the warm low light flickers and Rick’s standing too. 

He stretches, blue checkered button-down long enough that it doesn’t ride up for once, and his face does a little pain-spasm and he stills abruptly, hands slowly coming down, right hovering briefly over his side and _oh yeah he’s injured._ Rick, unfeeling asshole that he is––it had slipped his mind.

Cliff sighs and smacks his lips and is clearly not going to acknowledge that he’s hurting, and Rick knows mentioning it will get him brushed off, so he doesn’t. He just watches Cliff rub the heel of his palm absentmindedly against the bone jut of his hip, right above where Rick knows the injury to be, then brings it up to smooth his shirt and scrub his jaw, where the mixed silver-blond hairs have moved past five o’clock and are creeping back around.

“Well, that’s it for tonight,” Cliff says as he moves towards the kitchen stiffly. Long fingertips trail the counter and then stop at a little white pharmaceutical bag Rick hadn’t noticed earlier. He’s already walking as he calls over his shoulder that he’s gonna borrow Rick’s bathroom, and despite that Rick’s only half-drunk, having held off on the whiskey sours to stay in one spot and drink cheap beer on the couch, it’s not until the door slams that he realizes Cliff meant _his_ bathroom.

“W–wait, wait, wait, hold on a sec. Cliff! That’s mine! Hey! Use the bathroom down the hall! Hey!”

Cliff’s laughter floats out through the closed door as Rick smacks it with the back of his hand. He isn’t gonna use his own guest bathroom, fuck no, this is his house, he’s gonna stand right here in the hallway by his bedroom and wait for Cliff to come out. 

Except, Rick is probably the least patient person alive. 

He can only stand there for so long before he’s turning around, searching, dissecting his house with his eyes, staring at the shapes and shadows until it’s all foreign to him. 

The poorly-lit hallway is unremarkable, undecorated, leading to open up into the living room where he can see the leather couch, the off-white carpet, the framing of the curtains and the mantle and the posters awash in buttery light that trails down back to him. Behind him, the bedroom door is ajar, revealing his bed with its king size mattress and cream sheets still mussed from Francesca. He hasn’t slept in it since– Jesus, since before leaving to Rome. From this angle he can’t see the cowhide backing over the head of the bed but he can picture it, russet splatter pattern on white fur and the dents behind the bedcorners from repeated slamming that he would like to claim is all rowdy sex, but he’s woken up violently one too many times and has a habit of flinging his body onto the bed rather than climbing in. 

It’s like looking into a window at his own life. Like the gaffers adjusting a scene, the set lights changing angle and suddenly he’s in a different place, even though he isn’t, he knows where he is. He’s in Rick Dalton’s house, which is his own house, which feels phony somehow, filled with props from his life that are also the real thing.

Inside the bathroom, the tap starts and he’s pulled abruptly towards the off-white door and the sounds of water flowing, inconsistent and interrupted, into the sink behind it. It feels kind of creepy, like he’s a fucking voyeur or something, and he tries not to listen, which of course means he can hear everything like it’s been amplified by ten.

Water splashes, wet sounds, the sink shuts off with a little squeak and dry cloth rustles. He pictures Cliff washing his hands, drying them. Somehow picturing it, an innocuous little ritual behind the privacy of a door, makes the violation worse. There’s more rustling, the light under the door shifting, the _fwip_ of moving fabric, a quiet sigh he feels dirty for hearing. Paper crunching, water running, wet cloth moving. He stills at a bitten-off but clearly audible hiss of pain.

“Cliff?” He approaches the door. Hesitates, wonders if this is a bad idea. Goes on. “You, uh, good there, old buddy?” A beat of silence.

He’s pushing the door open when a “Yeah,” slips through and there’s no time to stop. Rick feels all of that halfway-to-drunk-ness as he’s hit by the white brights around the mirror, has to rub his eyes before he looks up to meet Cliff’s blank stare, takes in the bareness, the waistband of his pants pushed down and the washcloth in his hands, and the dark, vaguely pink line on his right hip reflected in the mirror where it’s pointed. 

Cliff raises his eyebrows, makes a _can I help you_ expression. “Need somethin’?”

“I–I heard, uh, you– sounded like– uh.” He doesn’t finish that thought, sounds like a fucking idiot, or worse. “Jus’ checkin’ up,”

Cliff regards him, sizing him up or something, he doesn’t know, then turns his head back to the mirror and brings the washcloth back down to the black line on his hip, motioning with his other hand, having clearly elected to just roll with Rick’s bullshit as always.

“Doctor’s orders, gotta clean it daily and put that antibiotic shit on–” tilting his head to the counter where a little tube sits next to the now crumpled paper bag, covered in tiny writing, “–so it doesn’t get infected and I gotta go back. Which I have no intention of doing.” 

Rick moves into the bathroom, and Cliff’s body jumps slightly as he approaches because he’s pressing the washcloth back to his hip but his face is still, controlled, and Rick can see the stitches now from where he’s looking in the mirror. They’re precise and neatly spaced, with a knot of balled up twine at the bottom end. On the counter next to the tube is a bandage, curved and ever so faintly off-colored in the center, taped edges facing up, and beside that is his blue shirt, balled up. 

“Can you hand me the soap?” Cliff murmurs into his collarbone as he holds his head down, watching himself carefully. Rick does, and Cliff pulls the washcloth away, ever so gently tracing the edge of the soap over the stitches, then hands it back to Rick, slightly sticky, and runs the washcloth over his hip, uppermost part of it catching the bump of his hip bone as it goes.

Cliff mumbles to himself something about “no dried blood” and “a good sign”, then raises his head and slaps the washcloth into the sink edge. Rick’s standing beside him as he does it, and maybe it’s because they’re half-drunk and know each other, but the air in the bathroom isn’t strained or awkward in any way, the space of a foot between their bodies perfectly comfortable, and maybe Rick relishes the nearness a bit too much, but he’s always been a kind of touchy-feely guy. 

Cliff pushes a little bit of ointment on his thumb and rubs it on, and Rick finally looks away from his steady, working hands up to his profile, sees his mouth twitching up into a slight grimace, hair falling into his eyes. It’s a little intimate, sure. But this is _Cliff._

Then he’s done, tossing the tube back into the counter, landing with a crinkle on the white bag, pressing bandage back on. The motion of him tugging up his pants leads Rick’s eyes accidentally to the disappearing glimpse of his crack, and now he’s staring at Cliff’s ass, which is weird and definitely less comfortable.

Cliff, pulling down his shirt, says, “You mind?” and Rick nods absentmindedly as he points to something on the counter that Rick’s eyes won’t focus on. He blinks, watches the blur of light and color assembling his vision; shakes his head and sees Cliff picking up his razor, and then he’s standing there, edge of the counter pressing into his ass as he watches Cliff shave.

There’s a flick, and then cold wetness on his skin, splattered over his cheek and nose. He startles, awareness hitting him like a truck, and looks over. “The fuck?” Cliff’s fighting back a grin under his half-shaven face, shaving cream-covered razor in his hand, and then is honest-to-god _giggling._ Rick makes an offended squawk and wipes the cream on his face away away, and the giggles collapse into full-blown laughter and he’s snorting too, swatting at Cliff’s shoulder while Cliff raises an arm in half-assed defense, flicking more shaving cream at him when he sees an opening.

Like fucking children, they are, still grinning at each other after they eventually stop and Cliff goes back to shaving. That feeling, the atmosphere bubble he associates with the living room  
is back, safely encasing them in his too-big bathroom with smell of shaving cream–– _his_ shaving cream––and Rick thinks maybe it’s not just the living room; it’s in his assigned set trailers too, sometimes, and in the car as they’re rushing down the boulevard and the open dark roads. _Maybe it’s Cliff,_ he realizes, half-drunk and full of a feeling he can’t define.

The thought follows him as he slips into bed, later, feeling Cliff’s presence lingering around him even as he’s gone to sleep on the couch, Brandy curled up at his feet.

Maybe it’s Cliff. Huh.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> notes and references:
> 
> \- rick's pretty hungover (again) and reeling from the episode he had the day before. what a good time to realise how codependent you are on your buddy
> 
> \- cliff should probably Not have been driving. he's still coming off some pretty debilitating analgesic and the hospital advises a 24-hour wait before engaging in strenuous activity, including operating heavy machinery, which. that's driving
> 
> \- rick's dad was drafted for wwii in 1942, when rick was 12, and he died in combat. rick was raised by his mom until he left home at 18
> 
> \- the show rick & cliff are watching is get smart, a comedy series parodying the 60s american spy genre, which ran from 1965 to 1970 with 5 seasons. the scene described is from an episode in season 1 (don't ask which though, i couldn't tell you)
> 
> \- if anything seems inaccurate or you have any questions, hmu! im happy to make corrections


	3. wounds we don't know about

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> life goes on, and things are generally looking up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im posting this after midnight so here's a valentines gift to all of u i suppose
> 
> content warning: barely there mention of vomit, disgusting obliviousness, the usual unhealthy life habits

“We look almost happy out in the sun, while we bleed to / death from wounds we don’t / know about.” 

––Tomas Tranströmer, from “Streets in Shanghai”

*

There’s someone in the room with him as he wakes. Rick’s blinking at the ceiling, staring at the sunlight slicing over the dull alabaster from behind the curtains, roughened at the edges by the ceiling’s rough texture as he notices it; the presence inside the door and the weight of the air, unmistakably a person. Fear trickles into his gut as he comes to, freezing his body to the bed and shoving his mind through half a dozen scenarios that all end in his crumpled body in the front page news, and finally he jerks up, heart pounding, to see––

Nothing. No one.

“Fuck,” he mutters. “Shit.”

He kicks off the blanket and pulls a dressing robe off the floor, the Japanese one with red dragons patterning the silk––or is it Chinese? whatever–– and tugs it on over his boxers, wraps it around his torso, the belly fat he’s been ignoring, and creeps, cautiously, towards the door. The fear hasn’t gone away, he’s still vigil, waiting for someone to pop up and threaten him with a knife, or start screaming, or fire a gun, and he’s definitely still thinking about those fucking hippies but really, who wouldn’t?

But there’s no one behind the door, and when he walks down the hallway there’s just Cliff in the kitchen, rooting around the fridge, humming tunelessly. He turns around, notices Rick, offers a “mornin’, partner,” through a cigarette, and sets orange juice on the counter. The sound of the coffee maker percolating fills the space. Brandy is crunching away at her bowl.

Rick breathes out shortly. Cliff’s moving stiff, he notices, stiffer than yesterday, turning his whole body where he’s usually twisting at the waist, shuffling slow on the linoleum. Body-careful, though his arms are loose and swinging as always. 

He wanders up next to him, feeling at once that same feeling from last night; quiet revelation and recognition in one, that this is all new but isn’t, really. He’s seen it before, Cliff shaving, Cliff in his kitchen in the morning making coffee. Only this time in his bathroom rather than at a trailer sink or in a make-up chair, only in a t-shirt and boxers rather than fully clothed and this time without any waiting.

It’s fucking domestic, is what it is.

“How, uh, how’s the hip?” he asks, to see what Cliff is gonna say about it.

He gets a shrug. “It’s a little sore. I’ve had worse.” And he doesn’t like that. Cliff’s refusal to acknowledge his own pain––and Rick knows it hurts, he can see it, Cliff’s bruised his ribs to hell and back before and never stiffened the way he’s doing now, he’s walked off a bad fall onto hardwood that twisted his ankle, _this_ is worse––is annoying, quite frankly, though he can’t parse why.

Rick nudges Cliff out of the way as he’s opening a cabinet, hip checks him on his left side and, oh shit, Cliff catches himself with his right foot and hisses sharply, stumbles and looks up at Rick, eyes pinched.

“Go sit down,” he says maybe not gently but casually, while his gut’s clenching from the look Cliff’s shooting him, and jerks his head towards the stools on the far side of the breakfast bar.

Cliff’s mouth, tightened from pain, flattens at the corners, and he straightens silently, shuffling past Rick who’s fucking relieved but doesn’t say anything either, just pulls two mugs down from the already opened cabinet and pours them each coffee, adds a dash of milk to both mugs and hands one to Cliff across the polished granite top.

Cliff takes an assessing look at him, which Rick refuses to acknowledge, then takes a sip. Rick drinks a little, then asks, “You had breakfast?”

His eyebrows shoot up, and he sets down his mug. “Well I’ll be, is Rick Dalton offering to make me breakfast?” 

The words are light and mock-surprised, and Rick grumbles a “shut up” which is steamrolled by a teasing “Well, if you’re offering, I’ll take an egg sandwich with tomatoes and bacon–– you remember those sandwiches they served us at the _Land of the Giants_ shoot the first day?”

Rick scowls at him, squints mean and exaggerated that he knows Cliff won’t take seriously. “I’ll make you––eggs, and that’s it, some goddamn eggs and that’s it.” 

Cliff’s grinning at him now, chin propped up by an elbow on the bar top, sunlight in his mussed hair and Batman logo on his t-shirt wrinkled into a shape more resembling a fucked-up weiner dog, and Rick can’t help but let his mouth twitch up before he turns to grab a frying pan. He doesn’t cook really, much, but he knows how to fry a mean egg, and Cliff’s getting the full treatment.

Six eggs fried and ready, and Rick hands off a plate of three to Cliff and grabs the coffee pot on his way over, positions himself across the bar and digs in. Cliff lets out a little moan of appreciation and it sounds downright _dirty,_ and he realizes it himself, waggling his eyebrows as he shoves another forkful in his mouth.

Rick shakes his head, refills his cup and checks Cliff’s, refills his too. “So they–they, what, not give you any meds? For the pain, shit like that?”

Cliff answers around another mouthful of eggs. “Naw, and I couldn’t ‘fford tha’ shit anyhow. ‘Sides, ‘s not so bad.” 

“That’s the second time––you know, that’s the second time you’ve said that to–to me, and don’t fuckin’ think I believe it for one second, ‘cause I don’t.” He jabs his fork at Cliff for emphasis, Cliff’s eyes crossing slightly to follow it, and hopes Cliff realizes how serious he is, because he’s absolutely serious about this, actually fucking cares.

Cliff tries to wave him off, still half-smiling, but Rick isn’t having it; he’s moving past annoyed towards frustrated like a car down the interstate, crossing his arms and speech devolving, which only serves to further frustrate him. Maybe Cliff relents because he pities Rick, or maybe he’s just tired, but eventually he sobers, sighs, talks. 

“When I was driving, yesterday, I had to hit the brakes pretty hard and it fucked something up. I thought I was gonna sleep it off, but now it’s all stiff.” He rubs at his hip a little, then swallows some coffee.

And that’s not fucking right, and part of Rick wants to demand why he didn’t say anything, but he doesn’t. Maybe knows why. Instead, he stares at his half-eaten eggs for a moment, yolk perfectly runny across the plate, and says, “I can get you some.”

“Some what?” 

“Meds. For–for when it– y’know, when it hurts.”

Cliff stares at him for a long moment, and Rick wonders at all the things he probably wants to say. Doesn’t know what he wants him to say, really, but– Cliff’s leaning back, rolling his head to the side and rubbing at his jaw, scratching and his mouth drops open, huffs out a laugh-shaped sound. He tilts his head to peer at Rick.

“Fuck, you really gonna make me feel like an old man?” Another, quieter huff and he’s shifting forward, propping his elbows on the table. “Shit, Rick, I ‘ppreciate it.”

Rick thinks maybe his mouth twitches, and he picks up his fork, points it at Cliff.

“Don’t say I never did anythin’ for you.”

Cliff shakes his head, drops it, goes back to his eggs with a little grin. “Wouldn’t dream of it, partner.”

*

The first time he notices Cliff doing things for him––or, he thinks it’s the first time he noticed, he can’t really remember anymore, but going through his memories of Cliff Doing Shit For Him this one feels important, somehow––he’s still living paycheck to paycheck. Wasn’t long after they met, he knows, though fuck him if he’s gotta remember details. He was broke, that’s all he knows.

And it was winter, he knows that too. It doesn’t rain in L.A. the way it was doing in this memory outside of wintertime, which is still so goddamn fucking wrong; growing up in Missouri hadn’t prepared him for warm winters with fucking rain instead of snow like normal. 

It had been raining outside, heavy and constant, a rumbling white noise to back the sound of the TV chatter. He doesn’t remember what they were watching either, only that they’d been drinking, smoking, probably talking, and at the end of the night, Cliff had moved the glasses to the sink, the empty bottles to the trash.

Rick remembers finding it odd, because Cliff didn’t seem the type, y’know, to pick up other people’s shit, or clean up much in general. But he did; moved them off the table in front of them and checked to see that none of Rick’s scripts had gotten anything on them––Rick can distinctly recall the laugh track punctuated by _thumps_ of him picking up stacks and dropping them again, rain against the window pane.

Cliff didn’t say anything about it, and Rick wondered if he’d even fully noticed he was doing it, cleaning up. Maybe it’s out of habit, that he does these little things, picks up their drinks and puts them in the sink. It’s probably nothing to with him at all, though he likes to entertain that it is because he’s a self-centered piece of shit.

He also loaned Rick an umbrella, later mentioning to Rick with a conspiratorial grin he’d pinched from someone who’d left it on set, but that’s a different time, he’s pretty sure. Rick’s mom had said once he had a problem with mixing memories, putting events in different places and out of order. 

Maybe that time with the glasses and the scripts wasn’t the first time, who knows. Still feels important, significant or some shit. Because he learned something about Cliff, or just because of the general weirdness of a rainy winter––four years he’d been living here at least, at that time, ten years now and he still thinks it’s fucking bizarre, it doesn’t even _freeze_ ––or maybe because his memory is just shit. Whatever.

*

“Rick! How’s it goin’––haven’t been able to get in touch, where you been?”

Sam Wanamaker’s voice jumps down the line and out of the phone, as emphatic as he remembers. It’s less grating this time, now that he’s not hungover or anything, just comfortably in the warm living room of his own home, determinedly not thinking about what the phone had felt like under his hands covered in–– in fucking hippie face. Wet bits of skull and gristle and blood.

He clears his throat, leans his arm against the pole and presses his forehead against it, watching the carpet absently. “Uh, Sam, hey! I was–was down in– in, uh, Rome, y’know, doin’ some work there––”

Sam starts talking before he’s even finished, a habit all directors Rick’s ever worked with apparently share, annoying as hell. “Rome, really? That’s great, that’s great! Beautiful place.” He barely leaves Rick a chance to get a “yeah, it is, yeah,” squeezed in, already steamrolling ahead.

“But I’m glad you’re back, lemme tell you, I’ve been trying to contact you this past week but–what? No response! I was like, ‘hey, where is this guy!’ and you’re in fucking Italy, huh?” There’s a distant slap, like Sam’s smacked a nearby surface while talking. “But now you’re back, just in time!”

Rick’s head is spinning a little and he’s lagging a bit, processing the phone-hollow chatter. The skin of his forehead is warm against the back of his arm, slightly sticky as he shifts, hair itching. By the time he’s understood what the hell Sam’s on about, he doesn’t have time to ask what exactly he’s back in time for; Sam’s already answering. 

“We need Caleb back, _now!_ The producers loved him, scary evil Hamlet; they want to see more of him! We need you on set ASAP, Rick, this is happening now!”

“W–wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, hold on, Sam,” Rick manages. “When?” 

Sam’s grinning is audible. His voice is rising now, bursting against Rick’s ear. “Wednesday! We’ve been doing some script readings since Monday, a few scenes here, a few scenes there, with Jim, but we need Caleb here to get things really going.”

Rick’s stomach gave a little jump, a freefall feeling of joy. He feels the laughter bubbling up his throat. “That’s great, Sam, that’s fucking fantastic! We got the greenlight?”

“Yes, sir! They thought you were delightful––took a bit to get warmed up, but that scene with little Miss Trudi? They were all over that. They want you as a real character, a real part; not just a heavy. You’re a star, Rick!”

Holy shit. _Holy shit._

Rick can hardly breathe, his chest filled with air––no, something lighter, like helium. He thinks he gets out a ‘thank you’ and something about looking forward to it, and Sam hangs up with a quick reminder of Wednesday tomorrow, and then Rick loses control of his body, punches the air and shouts and laughs, babbling to himself. 

_It’s finally happening,_ he thinks, _it’s finally fucking happening._ His work, his talent, all these years stagnant after _Bounty Law,_ guest starring and doing fucking spaghetti westerns, of all things, he’s breaking back into the industry. He’s making it again.

Rick _Fucking_ Dalton.

*

When he tells Cliff about it later over shrimp egg noodles and beer he gesticulates so hard he nearly knocks the takeout carton out of his lap. 

His fork definitely goes flying, and Cliff laughs at him, face glowing in the warm light, Brandy barking at their feet. There’s a fever in him, and he feels overheated in his joy, oversaturated with this good thing he’s got. Cliff’s knee is pressed against his, something he notices only when Cliff relents in teasing him and claps a solid hand on his shoulder and every point of contact on Rick’s body lights up, brilliant and familiar, until he’s dizzy with it.

Rick’s standing next to him in the bathroom again tonight, and it’s not awkward this time either, not when Cliff’s still inflating his ego and grinning at him all sincere. Rick watches him in the mirror and hands him the towel and keeps him company. After he gets the script for _Lancer,_ they fall into routine: Cliff cleans his stitches and Rick watches, then Rick practices his lines and Cliff watches.

Rick’s always been vain, but he’s never spent this much time in his bathroom before. But Cliff’s there, and the warm bubble atmosphere. So it’s––it’s nice.

*

The birds are chirping something fucking awful. Rick didn’t even know there were birds in L.A. 

Brandy tugs at the leash, snuffling at some random ass spot on the ground, and Rick is squinting so hard he’s got a headache, though that might also have a little something to do with his massive fucking hangover. 

From the party last night. At Roman Polanski’s house.

Rick’s still reeling a little from that, _Roman fucking Polanski’s house, holy shit,_ because he has his delusions of granduer but this is something else, an entirely new level of _‘I fucking made it’_ and he’s more than a little terrified he’s going to make an ass of himself.

Sharon Tate’s sweet laughter is still faint in his head, her smile, the whole precious gem of her, the way her eyes had widened in delight as he accepted the cowboy hat someone drunkenly produced and put it on, low over his eyes and hip popped sharply in pose. Everyone in the room had cheered––not an uncommon occurrence in a house full of completely wasted individuals used to spectacle. Plenty had come up to him, many more than Rick ever would’ve thought, asking him what ‘Jake Cahill’ was up to now. 

They recognized him. _Him._ He mentions _Lancer,_ of course. A few of them have even heard of it.

The light off the car he’s walking by is expensive, glaring in the morning sun. Rick makes sure it knows it’s a bitch, except at some point he’s lost track of who exactly he’s letting know. Then he nearly topples over, arm almost goddamn yanked out of its socket by Brandy, the impatient little jackass––but he can’t be too mad. The last thing he needs is someone seeing Rick Dalton yelling at a car like he’s completely fallen off the wagon.

He makes sure to stick to the shade for the rest of the walk, glasses jammed against his face.

When he gets back to the house, Brandy walked and happy, he collapses face first on the couch, pressing his pounding head into the warm, creased leather. It smells amazing, worn hide and spice and musk. He breathes deeply. It’s something he knows, something close to home, and he can almost put a finger on it but then the thought slips away from him as he drifts.

“Hey girl,” he mumbles to the wagging tail in front of his face, later, feeling all the heaviness of recent sleep.

Brandy woofs quietly as he sits up, reaches his arms up and swings them around vaguely, stretching out the awkward angle they’d been pinned at. His house is quiet as he stops moving, air settling over everything like the bars of light between the window shades.

And beyond the window shades–– 

Cliff, outside, reclining in a deck chair in the backyard, arms folded behind his head, awash in sunlight and glowing like some fucking marble statue–no, bronze, exposed skin tanned and faintly glistening under the heat. He’s got sunglasses on, white-rimmed ones that might be Rick’s, though they share things like glasses so interchangeably it was just sort of _theirs_ now. Closer, he can see the slack lines of Cliff’s face that means he’s asleep.

Rick’s nose bumps the wooden slats barring the window. He feels ridiculous, spying on Cliff through the blinds, and opens the sliding glass doors to the deck.

The sunlight is bright, glittering up at him from the pool, and the fucking _smell_ ––chlorine and something burnt, charred flesh and hair. Rick recoils. It’s enough to make his eyes sting, nausea flowing up his throat fast, vomit in the back of his mouth. Jesus, fuck, how can Cliff stand this?

Well, Rick can’t, that’s for goddamn sure. He goes back inside and fixes himself a whiskey sour.

*

“Man, how c– how could you stand t’be out there? ‘S fucking awful.”

Cliff gives him a vaguely amused shrug, raising an eyebrow. “Wasn’t that bad, partner. That hangover ‘a yours give you trouble?”

Rick drops another cherry into his drink, pops his fingers in his mouth to clean the juice off. “Yeah, hurt like a fuckin’ bitch.” The whiskey sour is, obviously, perfect; making them is practically second nature by now, Rick’s convinced he could do it in his sleep. He doesn’t see what his hangover has to do with the fact that his pool still smells like roasted hippie chick, even though Cliff drained and refilled it, but he gets distracted before he asks.

Cliff’s tried to stand up, but his leg must’ve seized or some shit, because he grabs for the counter and his Bloody Mary crashes to the floor. 

“Oh shit, Cliff!”

Cliff’s body is a furnace against his, pressed together ankle to shoulder as Rick loops an arm across his back and tugs him back up, and Cliff’s hair brushes his cheek, and at this close proximity Rick can smell him, the vodka and hot sauce on his breath and the musk underneath, leather and cigarettes and Cliff himself, and _that’s_ what he’d been smelling on the couch earlier, oh. And okay, maybe it’s a little weird, but Cliff smells fucking good and is also _in pain, jackass, pay attention._

“‘M fine,” Cliff grunts, then staggers slightly, skull pressing into Rick’s forehead.

“The fuck you are,” Rick grits out back, manuvering Cliff carefully away from the bar and towards the couch. 

They make it to the couch somehow, and Cliff flops down on it much like Rick did earlier except on his back, so Rick can catch the wince. They’re both panting like they’ve run a race, and Rick taps his shoulder, has him scoot down on the couch so he can sit beside him, except Cliff doesn’t scoot at all, and Rick’s suddenly got a lapful of blond hair.

He’s maybe freaking out, just a little, because the weight of Cliff’s head on his thigh combined with the smell of him is making him a little hot under the collar, and that’s not something he’s willing to think about right now or maybe fucking ever because he’s not suicidal, God _fuck._

But then Cliff sighs, a quiet, gentle thing, and Rick’s tired, melting into the couch again, comfortable and with a body next to him, which is always guaranteed to make him relax.

The next morning, Rick wakes with a crick in his neck and Cliff’s mischievous blue eyes watching him from below that crinkle into a smile as they meet his.

Rick thinks, _“This isn’t a bad way to wake up.”_

Rick thinks, _“I’m so fucked.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> do tell me what you think! any mistakes are mine, and i appreciate corrections & questions!


	4. the begging of my body

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> maybe, maybe, maybe, and a realization

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello everyone!!! a conclusion, long time coming, is finally here
> 
> content warnings: concerning lack of respect for real medical attention, mildly violent nightmares, vomiting, and a disgusting amount of yearning

“What a terrible song, the begging of my body.  
I am the knife. I am the knife. I am the knife.”  
— Sanna Wani, from “Emergence,”

*

Rick _is_ kinda fucked, no doubt, now that he keeps noticing shit, like the weight of Cliff’s voice and the linger of his smell and the swell of his arms––all shit he’d noticed before, noticed but not _noticed,_ and when did he lose the ability to not think about things––but it doesn’t really change much until Cliff loses the stitches. 

Rick comes home from walking Brandy, something which started as a favor to Cliff while his hip was still stab-fresh and somehow ended up being his thing––and shit, Brandy’s a good dog. He’s not a heartless bastard, always loved the little shit, but lately he’s been catching himself calling her “his” dog. It’s not true, but it’s better than when he calls her “theirs”. She’s not a pair of goddamn sunglasses, she’s _Cliff’s,_ and Rick’s been getting the feeling lately he’s been taking too much of Cliff’s already.

He’s ready to commence the familiar-new evening routine of sitting maybe just a little too close to Cliff on the couch, drinking and laughing at the TV, and he’s just pulled out last night’s leftover Indian when he sees Brandy make for his bedroom. 

“Cliff?” is his first thought. As it always seems to be these days.

She’s nosing at his bathroom door, and Rick hooks a finger in Brandy’s collar and pulls the door open to see Cliff, his shirt off and jeans pulled down under the swell of his ass, and Rick’s brain does a little stutter-stop, just for a second, before he sees the nail scissors in Cliff’s hand.

“W-What’re y’ doin’, old buddy?” he asks, unable to stop his eyes from resting on the ever familiar neat line on his hip.

Cliff, little grin-crook of his mouth in place, rolls a shoulder vaguely. “Gettin’ rid of these stitches, finally. ‘S been long enough, according to the good doctor, so I figured I’d spare them the visit and do the job myself.”

Rick wonders, then, just how many times Cliff’s done this, and all the little scars he’s ever seen––eyebrow, bicep, knuckles, thigh––and ignores the little trill of his heart that both hurts and hungers. Cliff murmurs a little “hey, girl” to Brandy, who strains out of Rick’s slackened grip and goes up to snuffle at his thigh. He rubs her head with his free hand, then gives her snout a little shove, sending her ambling back to Rick.

“Need help?” Rick offers, like a fucking idiot.

“‘M all good, partner.”

So that’s that, then. Except it’s not, because Rick stays in the bathroom as always, and Cliff lets him, as always.

He can see the shine of wet on Cliff’s skin that tells him he’s already washed off, and Rick’s stupidly offended that Cliff started without him, as if that’s a normal thing to be upset by. Jesus Christ, this–– _thing,_ whatever it is, has gotten so bad. What the fuck is wrong with him?

Cliff’s large hands work easily, pinching where Rick knows the knot of thread to be and tugs it up, sliding the tiny scalpel-sharp blades of the nail scissors under and there’s a familiar snip of metal against metal. The tweezers move to the other end and pull, delicate and steady, and Rick can only watch in fascination as the thread moves out of Cliff’s skin, like the little water snakes he saw sometimes in the ponds back home.

Without the thread, the wound is an angry pink line, strangely naked now that it’s just skin. Cliff goes for a cursory dab of the washcloth again and straightens up, stretching his arms up and twisting, muscles flexing. A quiet sigh of relief, across the bathroom which suddenly feels too big again. Brandy pants a little, from her spot next to him.

Rick feels, somehow, he should be looking away. He doesn’t.

*

He first uses the pool the same day he buys his house. It’s a fucking dream, a fantasy come alive, all bright blue and shining under the California sun. The swimsuit he’s wearing is ancient, red that’s been fading since 1959, and his first thought after climbing out is that he’ll buy a new one. Rick, the one he left behind, the little boy from Missouri who’d worn shoes until the soles scraped raw and went skinny dipping in the summer because he’d outgrown his swimsuit, danced within him. 

Cliff had swung by later, he remembers, to help him unpack. Rick remembers his hair dripping wet on Cliff’s shoulder as they pulled together for a hug goodbye. 

He remembers a lot of things that way, he’s now realizing, through Cliff; remembers moments because Cliff had touched him or laughed or been there. Cliff, his rock, his lifeline, who he’s only ever seen once using his pool.

It’d been a while after moving in, maybe a year or two, hard to tell in L.A.’s neverending sunshine. He’d offered, Rick did, said something about how he deserved it, and Cliff had laughed, and he’d been working for hours, Rick remembers, because his hair stuck to his face, shorter than it is now and curling at his cheekbones, as he shook his head. His skin was dark with sun––summer, then––and he’d stripped down to dark grey briefs before jumping in, angling his body to send most of the water onto Rick, jackass that he is. The smell of chlorine strong around them as the water surges.

Rick remembers tackling him, a shout of delighted surprise, strong arms catching him at the waist. Remembers Cliff pushing him down, under the water, smile wide and unyielding, the press of his body against him.

Maybe he’d had this _thing_ for Cliff then, too––maybe he’s always had it. But in the pool with him, Rick had only noticed the joy of his movements, the laughter of his body as he shoved around in the water, delightedly carefree, and wanted more of it.

*

After dinner, Cliff doesn’t head for the bathroom, doesn’t leave the door cracked, doesn’t wash his stitches as Rick watches because they’re not there anymore. He puts the used glasses and empty bottles and dirty plates on the counter and lays back on the couch, Brandy curling up at his feet. 

Rick stays beside him as long as he feels he’s allowed, then goes to bed. 

Okay, okay, he misses it. He wants.

Wants, wants, _wants,_ so badly his whole body aches with it, but he doesn’t know for what. Wants Cliff– what? Back in his too-big bathroom and radiating heat next to him, a body beside him? To touch the stitches on his hip, rough and serrated over otherwise smooth skin, like he’s trying to reassure himself of something, like that’s something he’s allowed to do, like that isn’t _fucking weird?_

It’s– shit, it’s _lonelier,_ and he cannot believe himself, of all fucking things, and there’s gotta be something wrong with him because nothing’s _fucking changed._

Cliff still grins at him every morning, though, and lets him too-close next to him at the counter, shoulders and elbows brushing. They have their coffee, and Cliff makes french toast dripping in butter or bacon dripping in fat and Rick fries the eggs. 

Cliff still drives him to set, still picks him up, still listens to him chatter and stutter and complain. Rick reads and recites his lines and bitches about them, thinks they’re shit and it’s a goddamn blessing he can act. They have their takeout dinner: Chinese, Italian, burgers, Mexican. 

Cliff still watches TV with him, laughs and comments and smokes. They press close on the couch with their beers and Rick’s whiskey sours and Cliff’s Bloody Marys. The smell of him seeps into Rick’s clothing, rubs on the leather. Brandy curls up in their laps.

And Rick’s still lonely, and wanting.

And if he’s being honest now, admitting shit, then maybe he’s always been lonely, since he was a child, a problem deeper than just this, now; lonely, with or without Cliff. Though Cliff– he helps. He really does.

Cliff, his best friend, his more-than-brother, his stunt double who hasn’t been stunting or working for more than a month. Rick still pays him for the favors he does around the house, still gives him the money for the groceries that are now their groceries. 

Cliff doesn’t really work for him anymore. He’s just a friend staying in Rick’s house as he heals––

Oh. Shit.

Rick’s waiting for him to leave. 

Like a body anticipating a hit, he’s flinching, tense since Cliff took out those stitches. Cliff’s got no reason to stay anymore, certainly doesn’t need him, can’t double for Rick or anyone else so he’s basically out of the industry. Rick’ll stop seeing him, and then they’ll drift apart and Rick will be too awkward to call and Cliff won’t either, and then he’ll be gone.

And Rick’s panicking a little, now, because he _can’t,_ not anymore. Cliff– Cliff’s ruined him for anything else. He told him in Rome he didn’t need him anymore and it wasn’t true, it was his own fucking hubris that ever let him believe it, the high of marrying a pretty girl and posing for paparazzi pictures, like any of it was ever going to last. And then the whole fucking fiasco and Cliff was accepting his offer and sleeping on his couch like he’s always been there, and Rick doesn’t know what he’s gonna do when he’s gone. Rick needs him, he really fucking does. But Cliff doesn’t need him.

Fuck. Jesus, shit, goddamn it.

Rick fucking Dalton, ladies and gentlemen.

*

He doesn’t say anything, of course. 

When Cliff moves out, it’ll be on his own terms. Until then, Rick will be here, sharing his space and watching him and taking what Cliff offers. He’s taken so much of Cliff’s already.

*

When there’s a knock on the door, Rick gets it. Cliff’s behind him in the kitchen, putting all the stuff back under the sink that Rick hadn’t even known was there, cleaning supplies and extra paper towels and trash bags and shit. He’s just fixed the sink, which’s been leaking since Tuesday. 

It’s Sharon Tate.

Her chirped “hey, Rick!” and the fact that Sharon Tate is _on his doorstep_ flusters Rick, just a little, and he’s definitely made a fool of himself as he stammers out something vaguely greeting-like back. It’s a testament to his shock that he doesn’t immediately notice the basket in her hands.

“Brought you something!” She raises the basket slightly, sways it. “Can I come in?”

“Oh– uh, yeah, come– come on in! Welcome, welcome. Uh, to _mi casa.”_

Rick is an idiot. It is not news, but it is embarrassing. He can tell Cliff’s grinning from where he’s kneeled–– Rick fucking knows it, doesn’t matter that his face is turned away.

“Hi!” Sharon says to the back of Cliff’s head.

Cliff shuts the sink cabinet door and stands, graceful, wiping his hands on the back of his faded jeans, looking for all the world like some handyman straight out of a shitty porno, broad-shouldered and bare-chested and handsome. “Hello, ma’am,” he returns, all politeness.

“I’m Sharon, from next door,” she offers, and either she knows Cliff’s more than hired help or she’s the most fairytale princess girl-on-the-block woman Rick’s ever met.

“Cliff Booth.”

Recognition bursts a solar flare across her sunshine face. “Oh, I know you! Rick’s mentioned you– you’re his stunt double, right?”

Cliff is definitely grinning at him now, one eyebrow ticked up. “That’s right, ma’am.” Rick wants to strangle himself, or Cliff, or maybe both.

Sharon settles in at the kitchen table at Rick’s offer, setting the basket down in front of her. It’s a cute little thing, looks straight out of the movies, wicker woven with a yellow and blue checkered cloth over it. In fact, Rick could swear he’s seen one on TV before. 

It’s– jarring, honestly, to see her at his table, in his house, golden as can be in a short white maternity dress. A veritable angel under the yellow living room light. Rick doesn’t know what he’s done to deserve this.

Sharon props her elbows up on the table and leans in. “Rick, when you were over last– last week? You made all those drinks for everyone! It was so sweet of you, and especially those whiskey sours–– Jay absolutely loved his, said it was perfect, and I got a taste and it really was delicious!” 

And now Rick’s head is spinning, because Sharon Tate is in his house heaping compliments on him like he’s something special, and she turns to Cliff to tell him “He’s amazing to watch, I’ve never seen a drink made so easily!” like this is something to be admired, like he’s something to be admired, like he’s not a fucking alchoholic and makes himself whiskey sours every single goddamn day, that’s why it’s _easy,_ and Cliff’s going along with it, nodding and when he looks at Rick it’s not with pity and Rick wants to scream.

Sharon turns back to him, light radiating off every part of her, streaming into his kitchen. “And you had all those extra yolks from the eggs when you were making them, and you put them in a cup and you were going to throw them away, but I thought I’d keep them, because there’s no reason to waste perfectly good yolks.” She sits up straighter, tucks her hair behind her ears. “So I made these! And I thought I’d share, since they were your yolks.”

She tugs the dainty blue–yellow cloth off the basket and tucks it underneath, and Rick leans forward to see a whole bunch of small pastries that look a bit like flat muffins.

“Custard tarts!” she says, and Rick wants to kiss her, just a little.

Cliff’s back in the kitchen as Rick waves at Sharon from the doorstep, so they’re both back where they started this afternoon, and the sky’s darkening now, which means Sharon fucking Tate sat at his dinner table and talked and smiled and ate custard tarts with them for hours and _holy shit_ Rick might pass out.

The world swings around a bit as he turns away from the closed door, and Rick is feeling a lot of something, heavy in his chest, making his skin buzz. With the darkness in the windows, the room’s shrunk, and the light is both dimmer and brighter without the mingling sunlight.

There’s a little huff of laughter from the kitchen, and Rick meets Cliff’s amused eyes, Cliff’s raised brows. “Fuck off,” Rick says. Cliff laughs again, more solidly this time.

“Didn’t say nothin’, man.”

Rick scowls at him, heart beating double time for some reason, watching Cliff’s chin drop so he’s smiling into his chest as he flips through the little paper takeout menu from the new place downtown––”Heard from Sadie– th–the hair ‘n makeup one, yeah, that the, uh, Thai? That new Asian place; apparently ‘s good shit.” “Sounds good, partner.”––and he kind of wants to deck him, half tempted to because Cliff wouldn’t let him, would catch his arm and wrestle him down or maybe just deck him back. And fuck, is Rick really that desperate for his hands on him?

He watches Cliff a moment longer, in the kitchen, flipping through the garishly colored menu and rubbing absentmindedly at his hip, and thinks he doesn’t want to answer that question.

*

Rick’s in the pool, and there’s a girl next to him. It’s nighttime, L.A. stars above them faint in the almost-dark sky, struggling through the light pollution. Rick’s sipping a whiskey sour and she’s eating custard tarts. She looks like an angel dressed in all black. There’s screaming, somewhere in the distance. 

“‘M headin’ out. Need anything?”

Cliff is standing in the open doorway. There’s broken pieces of glass at his feet and Brandy, tail wagging. He’s smiling, his ever-present lopsided grin, familiar and beautiful. His hair is glowing in the light silhouetting him, golden and warm and Rick can smell him, the spice and leather and smoke. 

“I always need something,” Rick tells him, unsure of his own seriousness. Cliff laughs.

Rick’s smoking, himself, whiskey sour pooling in his mouth around the cigarette, and he’s wearing those old red swimsuit boxers. Disgusted, he decides he’s going to change, swims to the edge and climbs out, takes the large hand offered to him. 

Cliff’s hand, wrapped around his own, wet and hot. Red. 

Rick looks at him. There’s a knife in his hip, and Cliff lets go of him, pulls out the knife. Blood pours all over the pool deck. Cliff is still grinning.

The angel in black gets out of the pool. The screaming is louder now. She smells like bleach and custard. Her black-blonde hair is dripping, water running and mixing with the blood, swirling and dark. Cliff stabs her in the hip, and she crumples. Gets up. Runs into the light-filled doorway, screaming.

Rick is choking on the bleach-blood smell, Cliff’s scent and leather gone, drowned out. There’s glass shards underfoot, and the remains of a porcelain plate. Brandy barks, just once, standing next to the hose. He’s still wearing his ugly red swimsuit. 

Cliff jumps into the pool, whooping in delight and splashing up towards Rick. The water is turning dark around him. The smell of smoke lingers in the air, but Rick’s cigarette is gone.

“Need a ride?” he hears Cliff’s voice behind him. He turns towards the doorway and the angel is there, holding a basket. In the basket is a gun.

“I can get a taxi,” he tells her. His dad in the doorway, holding an army rifle, shrugs and walks into the light.

Behind him in the pool, Cliff is on fire. Rick shouts, runs to the edge of the water. “Don’t need your help,” Cliff tells him easily. 

Rick watches him burn, flame-thrower strapped to his chest.

*

Rick wakes up, runs to the bathroom, and vomits. 

Brandy snuffles his hand as he wanders down the hall towards the kitchen, bumping her head into his thigh and skittering beside him. He feels dizzy, and the wetness of her tongue barely registers against his skin, her pants and whines sounding very far away. He remembers, vaguely, that dogs can feel what people are feeling, but that doesn’t make sense because he doesn’t even know what he’s feeling.

The morning sun through the kitchen window pierces him, too-bright and pulsing behind his eyes, and Rick can’t even bother to rub at them, stares into the white light and feels the sting, eyes watering.

Cliff is watching him when he looks over, and something about the way he’s holding his body sets Rick on edge. He looks like he’s about to run, or attack; a wild animal assessing a threat. Rick’s heart beats like its trying to be afraid, but he’s too fucking tired. God, he’s so fucking tired.

No “good morning” forthcoming, Rick’s body collapses onto his stool at the breakfast bar. The smell of coffee churns his gut, still nauseous from being violently emptied earlier. On the counter by Cliff’s elbow is last night’s Thai basil chicken, and Rick tastes bile in the back of his throat. He looks away, instead, to Brandy, who’s watching him with her worried dog eyes from the couch.

Brandy’s watching him, Cliff’s watching him, the whole goddamn world is watching him. The urge to break something surges up within him, the ugly desire to put his hand through a window or smash all his collectible shot glasses or throw the coffee machine into the wall. Anything that shatters.

“You okay, Rick?”

Cliff says it all quiet and gentle and fucking sincere, uses Rick’s name and everything like he’s calming something, like Rick’s the animal here and not him, like Cliff doesn’t walk like a predator and collect scars and scare people. Rick wants to say something mean, maybe ask him about the war or why he drives like he’s got the feds after him, but Cliff’s got a hand on his hip, pressing the palm absently into where he knows the scar is and Rick is so tired.

“When are you gonna leave?” He asks it without thinking, only realizing what he’s saying as he hears it come out, didn’t even realize he’d been thinking about it.

“What?” Cliff’s not a prowling beast anymore, he’s just _Cliff,_ looking confused and out of place in Rick’s kitchen. Jesus Christ, Rick’s an asshole. “Leave?”

Rick doesn’t answer the unspoken request for clarification. Keeps his eyes on Brandy by the couch, highlighted by the dusty sun pouring through the window, legs pulled tight under her body and champagne eyes restless between the people in the room. 

Silence, then: “Leave where?”

He turns to look at Cliff, because _what does that mean_ and he doesn’t want to be hopeful but there’s a little spark of it anyways, peeking out from his ribcage. Cliff’s moved forward; now there’s only the bartop between them, Cliff’s forearms resting along the marble, little crinkle between his brows deepened and mouth tight.

Then he asks, “You want me to leave?” Another question, but it’s one Rick can answer, has had the answer for for years, because Cliff’ll ask “You gonna need me for anything else?” and Rick can say no, because he knows Cliff will come back, will ask it again, but this– 

“No,” Rick says. And there it is.

“Rick,” he murmurs, and then pauses, searching Rick’s face and Rick doesn’t know what he’s looking for or whether he wants him to find it, but he just looks back at him, terrified and hopeful, knowing this means––something, he doesn’t fucking know.

Cliff shakes his head. “C’mere, man,” he murmurs, and lifts his arms, and Rick’s round the bar and hugging him before he can stop himself, clutching at his back and pressing his body into Cliff’s. Arms go around his neck firmly and he’s burying his face in Cliff’s hot neck, breathing in his own shaving cream and dog. 

It’s good. 

Okay, okay; Rick is fucking elated. Cliff knows Rick wants him here, in his home and his life, and has _opened his arms to him._ It feels like a promise, closer to a future than any fucking wedding vows.

Brandy barks at their feet and jumps up, resting her paws on the side of Rick’s thigh, tail wagging vigorously. A laugh is smothered into his shoulders, and then Cliff unhooks his arms, pulling their bodies apart slowly, smoothes big hands down Rick’s shoulders and claps him on the back, mouth turned up at the corners as he looks down at Brandy. 

“You feelin’ left out, girl?” Cliff asks her. Brandy whines at him. Rick huffs out a breath shaped like a laugh because he’s smiling too, a little, and looks down as she drops back to the floor. Cliff’s hands leave him to kneel in front of Brandy, rubbing at her head and talking to her, teasing her, to which she jumps up again and licks him right on the mouth. Cliff splutters. Rick laughs at him.

“That– that was, uh. Thanks, old buddy.” That failure of a sentence goes over his shoulder. Here they are: Cliff taking care of him again.

A squeeze of his bicep. “No problem. We all need a hug sometimes. Nothing to be ashamed of,” Cliff says lightly, cool as ever.

“Even you?” Rick teases. “Fuckin’–uh, stone cold Cliff Booth?”

Cliff’s face does an interesting twitch there, hands heavy against Rick’s elbows and it’s at this point Rick realizes he’s got his own hands resting on Cliff’s sides, above the hip bone, but moving his hands would be awkward now and Cliff’s watching him like he’s looking for something again.

“Even me,” he replies.

And his hands shift down, stroking over his arms and his sides, until they’re on Rick’s hips, mirroring him. Their foreheads bump, once, and rest together.

“Sounds– shit, old buddy, you’re getting soft,” Rick says, like he’s not equally soft. Cliff’s huff of breath goes hot over Rick’s lips.

“Maybe that’s not such a bad thing,” Cliff tells him, voice low, and Rick melts a bit closer, feels his muscles unbunch, tension draining into the linoleum under his feet as Cliff’s thumbs rub circles into his hip bones. Rick thinks he’s smiling his dopey smile, the one his mother had caught him with when he was fifteen and spending his afternoons with Hannah Jenkins and teased him for. Then Cliff winks. “Maybe I can be your next wife.”

Rick chokes. Cliff laughs, head thrown back, hair golden in the morning light and shoulders heaving with it, familiar lines of his face open in joy, the little scar that Rick still doesn’t know the story about white over his brow.

He’s still laughing when Rick kisses him.

*

“Y’know,” Rick says, drunk and staring up at the water stained ceiling, shitty carpet rough against his back, “Y’ know what?” 

An amused, equally drunk “What?” comes from the couch above him, and Rick rolls the one low syllable around his head for a moment before remembering what he was going to say. The rain––winter rain, it’s such a trip living here––rattles the piss–poor glass of his apartment windows. There’s a bottle, green glass, in the corner of his vision, stark against the shitty pale blue wallpaper. It’s one Cliff missed, when he was picking up earlier, and isn’t that the weirdest fucking thing, Cliff cleaning up like a goddamn housewife? _Cliff?_

“I’m– I’m not ever gonna get married. Never gonna get married. Not when I– not when I got you.” He tries to look at Cliff, but he can’t find him, just the ratty couch cushions where Cliff’s voice came from. Cliff, who doubles him better than anyone else he’s met in this shitty town, who listens to him complain, who picks up the bottles and the glasses and checks the scripts even though he’s gotta be just as drunk as Rick. “You take care ‘f me jus’ fine.”

Cliff’s head fills his vision, and his hair’s getting longer– he’s tucked a bit of it behind his ears. He’s got that grin, the crooked one Rick wants to imitate but can’t; he looks like a cowboy, a real one, unlike Rick’s play–imitation, and Rick sometimes wonders if he really is one, being from Texas that he is, the natural way he rides a horse and how good he looks in a cowboy hat.

Cliff looks down at him from the couch, cowboy smile and drunk eyes full of– affection, or something. “Yeah I do, partn’r. Somebody’s– someone’s gotta,” he slurs out easily, words curling and sliding out of his mouth.

Maybe, Rick thinks, young and drunk and hopeful, it’s something else in Cliff’s eyes, something more. Love, maybe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i thought the quarantine would give me the time to finish this, and it did but not before i spent two weeks attempting to wrestle my assignments down a respectable amount. but here we are!!!!! finally complete, and i hope you've enjoyed this story and the conclusion i came to :-) obvs rick hasn't magically healed from the trauma and definitely needs professional help, but at least there's more open communication between the two now
> 
> if there's anyone still around in this fandom, or who came back to read this last part: i love u. don't hesitate to let me know what you think!

**Author's Note:**

> rick's a bit too self-aware oops but it's physically painful to write anyone who doesn't have critical thinking skills so congratulations mr dalton on ur braincells


End file.
